ASEE promotes excellence in engineering teaching by targeting established professors for participation in teaching workshops, and by creating a forum for the exchange of ideas and successful classroom strategies. ASEE is widely recognized for its contributions in this area, and is a valuable resource. However, ASEE has largely overlooked a second population, which has great impact on the quality of engineering teaching: the future professors. To address this issue, several academic institutions have founded ASEE student chapters (1) with the goal of creating a forum for education issues among graduate students. Here we will highlight the activities of the University of Texas at Austin ASEE Student Chapter (2) which build upon the national ASEE Mission (3, 4)to develop the nation's future engineering professors: (1) to inform undergraduate students about the options and potential benefits of attending graduate school; (2) to raise the quality of graduate student teaching; (3) to enhance the teaching and presentation skills of prospective educators; (4) to encourage graduate student communication between different engineering departments; (5) to assist graduate students with the academic hiring process; and (6) to develop the skills needed to establish and lead a research program.
Insight into how a student chapter of the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) can survive through many years may be provided by the experiences of the ASEE student chapter at The University of Texas at Austin. ASEE student chapters offer many professional development opportunities for engineering students considering possible careers in academia. However, there are currently less than ten ASEE student chapters, and several ASEE student chapters that were initiated in the past are no longer active. In contrast to th is, the ASEE student chapter at UT-Austin has existed and remained active for six consecutive years. Issues that are important in the survival of an ASEE student chapter include promoting ASEE activities to both graduate and undergraduate students, keeping students involved, developing faculty support, and securing funding. By establishing and following procedures for addressing these issues each year, an ASEE student chapter may continue functioning from year to year.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.